Velochimp: Astrochimp on Cycling

Michael Rasmussen took control of the Polka Dot jersey with an very impressive break on the second mountain stage of the Tour. This gives Rabobank the weekend of victories with Pieter Weenien taking the stage on Saturday. The Rabobank team is having a successful Tour this year and Rasmussen, known as “The Chicken” for his skinny legs has upped his game to try and take the Polka Dot jersey. For a short time Rassy had the yellow jersey, but Jens Voight and former teammate Christophe Moreau brought back enough time so that Voight could take the Yellow.


Voight taking the yellow has taken some pressure off of the Discovery Channel team. The Discos were able to take back control of the peloton and were all to happy to oblige a break of riders such as Voight and Rasmussen. The major GC players stayed with Disco and rode along.

The GC contenders will rest tomorrow, but tuesday’s stage to Courcheval with a mountaintop finish will offer up some fireworks.

CSC has finally grabbed back the Yellow Jersey which they bitterly lost last Wednesday in the TTT after Dave Zabriske’s freak crash. The CSC team must be happy tonight, but they will have the duty of defending the Yellow on the next few mountain stages. Altough CSC will have the Yellow, there is one man that everyone is looking to attack and that is Lance of course. The Disco team had a hiccup on Saturday, but is this a “one bad day” that most riders or teams have once in a while or is this a sign of bigger problems? We will soon find out this week.

It is sad to see that Dave Zabriske decided to pack it in today. He had some tough injuries that made riding especially tough. He was fun to watch in this Tour and is going to be a big animator in the future.